


273 Moments of Silence.

by Deepdarkwaters



Category: 4'33" - John Cage (Song)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:28:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21923665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deepdarkwaters/pseuds/Deepdarkwaters
Summary: Listen.
Comments: 18
Kudos: 53
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	1. 1 Minute

**Author's Note:**

  * For [republic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/republic/gifts).



A breath held until it hurts.

Count the steps, but not out loud.

Something is clinging to the air, a floral ghost.

It's in here somewhere.

Flex your calf and watch the stocking stitches run.

The impossibility of consequences.

Vanilla seeds like freckles.

Henna, fire flickering through the crowd.

Swirling dust in a dagger of sunlight.

The secret weighs more than he does.

On the horizon the boat barely seems to move.

Daisies, day's eyes, staring at the sun.

The door is locked and the bells don't ring.

Ladder stitch makes the mend invisible.

The stillness that follows an unanswered phonecall.

Real butter spread right to the edges.

He's parting his hair on the left now.

There's only two of you on the beach and you don't say hello.

Shh. It's coming.

Broken horsehair dangling from a bow.

The nothingness whisper of a green satin ballgown.

Taste what comes from your eyes: warm, salt.

You know you're forgetting something but can't remember what.

Hoarfrost.

A swipe of coral lipstick like crime scene tape on your face.

Trying to imagine the size of Jupiter.

It's not your fault. It's not.

A hundred ants marching.

There's a ghost in you, and a skeleton.

The rainbow sheen on a soap bubble.

It's obvious she's swallowing a yawn.

You could faint in libraries from the overdose of stories.

Sugar crystals licked away.

Ask him to explain that joke and enjoy the painful silence.

If she saw it, she'd hate it.

Float in chlorine. Let the water in your ears muffle the world.

He curls up, that cat, like a fancy bread roll in the bakery.

It's not there. It could be anywhere.

Sunflower yellow cashmere gloves.

If you looked at her eyes forever you couldn't count the colours.

Now you know how Pandora felt.

A robin's egg on the path: blue, broken, and empty.

The weight of sand falling.

He looks so hopeful.

Clever brave little flower making a home in the pavement crack.

Mercury rising.

Stripes of crimson polish gleaming: left, right, centre.

Pirouetting thistledown.

Watch with subtitles while she sleeps. They're speaking Persian, anyway.

Roses unfurl.

Glaciers move faster than this.

Run your fingernail there. That's a bird base.

There are two enormous looming rabbits in the cumulus.

He's not breathing. He's stopped breathing.

A nightmare so bad you can't even scream.

When you try to crack your knuckles, nothing happens.

Ninety million tiny hexagons descend.

If you listen too hard to the second hand the ticks come farther apart.

A disapproving curtain twitch.

There's not even a breeze today.


	2. 2 Minutes

Can you imagine what she'd say? Really think about it.

Stir the paint until it's one colour, not two.

Ktbl, purl, all the way around.

Ready or not, it's time to go.

The space between the gurgles in the pipes.

Honey on your fingertips, on your tongue.

He said he misses church but not the assassination of silent disapproval.

A hundred and forty two years she's been smiling from the carte de visite.

Lick your fingers and pinch out the flame, it won't hurt.

He didn't mean it like that, did he?

Wait for the window fog to fade away.

A sprinting spider.

She could kiss you where it hurts and it wouldn't any more.

That floorboard used to creak.

Base notes of... what?

The most arrogant pigeon you've ever seen.

She licks the envelope glue with such care, always afraid of paper cuts.

Moonbeams like liquid opals.

The arrow shaped runes of bird footprints in snow.

Shine it til you can see your face there.

A failed flame.

The slow push of twilight.

What's her name? Shit, what's her name?

A wax crayon grave rubbing, ancestral bones under your feet.

Perfume lingers.

Oil paint cracks on his beautiful portrait.

Nobody speaks but you know they're just a room away.

Tell it to the rainbow.

Agápe, éros, philía, philautia, storgē, xenia.

The smell of baking bread is like a hug you didn't know you needed.

You never see the blossom falling but it's always on the ground.

He should have left Sleeping Beauty in peace, really.

Push the dust into the corners.

A lost helium balloon, ascending forever.

The nothingness tick of a sundial.

You can remember if you close your eyes.

One little nick in the tape and the whole strip falls apart.

Light a candle and stare until your reflection becomes the Devil.

Fingerprints ghosted on a wine glass.

Remember how warm his hands were.

You always secretly hope the Trafalgar Square lions will roar.

Stillness, eternal, between the lightning strikes

The awkward pause when you ask if he believes in fate.

Memories of a half-forgotten July.

Tip of your tongue but you can't pluck it off.

The ice cubes melt too quickly to clink.

Ghosts are real. They must be.

Sheep lining up to be counted into oblivion.

The sacred scent of old bookshops.

She must have mended the dripping tap.

The eyeroll shared with a stranger you never see again.

Secret red silk underwear.

He saw a dryad once. He swears it.

A half-remembered melody.

The smiling, breathless moment before she says yes.

Buzzards, soaring.

Where is the boundary between archaeology and grave robbing?

A dusting of nutmeg.

The ruby ones are nice but are the emeralds nicer?

There's too much to think about here.


	3. 3 Minutes

Spell his name right this time.

The possibilities are endless if you're brave enough to try.

The colour of twilight only exists there.

How does she do that?

Fountain pen ink, gleaming green, glides around the cursive.

Palms too sweaty to take her hand.

A baby rabbit, brown and round and curious.

She looks just like her.

Just - please.

Auburn corkscrew curls wrapped around a finger.

A cast shadow flickering across the floorboards.

You could slice a knife through what he isn't saying.

Check again, carefully.

It'll be as quiet when you leave as it is when you're here.

He wouldn't believe you so why even say it?

Rosehip tea in your favourite mug.

A dream is more real than being awake.

Oh my god. Oh god.

There's always a single shoe abandoned in the road.

A lost feather curling in the wind.

The squirrel moves up the tree like backward lightning.

Bitterness corrodes everything.

Draw the heavy curtains.

It feels profound, sometimes, to say nothing.

Corduroy is an invitation to touch.

Hyacinths were always her favourite, sugar-pink stars.

Pillow chocolate, 2 a.m.

You always thought the stars should roar like bonfires.

Silence is no more empty than any other language.

I thought it was him.

Clouds playing kiss-chase across the sky.

Someone's scattering ashes here.

You can't ask her that.

How many stories have ever been forgotten?

A stray cat searching for adventure.

The wood grain looks like sheet music.

He's taking your pulse. Let him have it.

Aching weariness.

The biggest murmuration you ever saw.

Fresh cotton smells like new life.

Hope can't exist without something to feed it.

You can't feel the wind but you can see the grass bend.

Pacing, pacing, pacing.

The cloisonne colours of a dragonfly.

Remember curling the phone cord around your finger while you waited?

The city in the half hour before dawn.

How is that possible?

Embers.

Feel it - the muscle, stretching.

Blue lights spin but the siren is missing.

It's December. Change the calendar from September.

Two pigeons fighting the other side of the double glazing.

There must be a name for that burnished pink in the sky.

It could be loneliness, but it feels too comfortable.

Flock wallpaper, peeling.

Yeah but did she like me or like-like me?

Sometimes you wish for tinnitus.

The wet cloud masks the mountains and they disappear.

There are ripples in the lake but you saw nothing fall in.

Meet his eyes by accident and feel restless all day.


	4. 4 Minutes

She feels so far away sometimes.

It's not the whistling kind of grass.

Two strangers walking arm in arm.

The church bells stop but the air goes on quivering.

Well, now what are you going to do?

No clever surgeon could ever put this together again.

A teaspoon a person and one for the pot.

Countless butterflies.

If you can't save him, what's the point of anything?

Fog at your ankles, creeping, clinging.

The sun looks tired.

Imagine if you could count the raindrops.

The leaves underfoot turn slippery with rot.

It's not as bad as it looks in the mirror.

Daybreak shivers.

Two dead flies on the windowsill.

If you break the silence, who knows what might come through the crack?

Don't flush after midnight and wake everyone up.

Is it a kestrel? I can't tell.

There were half a dozen people living here once.

He used to smile with his eyes more than his mouth.

Why the actual fuck would you use that font in work correspondence?

Pillows seem to hold lost scents longer than physics should allow.

There's no colour like an apple blushing.

Spilled glitter.

The sway of the hammock.

You dream of the moon splintering and wake up crying.

It can't last forever.

Whisper when the snow's falling, or don't say it at all.

Newsprint faded to sepia.

It's honeysuckle.

A flourishing signature to be proud of, that.

Garbo's face doesn't need sound, or subtitles.

You pull the loose thread and, fascinated, unravel the entire sleeve.

There's nothing tapping on the window, it's tapping in your mind.

He never said thank you and she never said sorry.

A trapezoid of seaglass between the pebbles, absinthe-green.

Why does a dwindling hourglass make you feel so inexplicably sad?

You feel so in tune with the world sometimes, like you're not one of seven billion.

Rising cakes filling the house.

The second smile is easier than the first.

You could see to the end of the world from here.

Tricks are real, but so is magic.

Gauze drapes billowing.

Can't hear the footsteps but you see the wet footprints.

Shadows as long as cathedrals.

Awake two minutes before the alarm.

Imagine the sound the sun would make up close.

Crisp linen, folds as sharp as paper.

The final lingering drips of sunset.

It's for her. Never forget it's worth it.

Illamasqua Sangers on your teeth.

The middle C died.

Write your name in the nap of the velvet.

Mortification.

The scent of lavender before you even see the fields.

His favourite colour is everywhere.

Turning the last page.

Another dawn, and another, and another.

Her first name on a gravestone but the surname is just moss.


	5. 33 Seconds

If spirits were real your agorophobia would kill you.

A stranger nodding his head to an imaginary beat.

The deftness of fingertips.

A sunbeam like a staircase rising through the clouds.

They say even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

Cavorting ladybirds.

Let it out in a cushion, nobody's going to hear.

She plaited her hair as easily as breathing.

Five berries in the basket and one in your mouth.

It's only a dream.

There's always going to be daffodils.

The hesitation before her uncertain yes.

He would always turn up his shirt cuffs three times.

A million tiny cresting waves.

Forensic inspection of nothing at all.

The overwhelming peace of acceptance.

Let it melt on your tongue.

Fireflies like pinpricks stabbed through the night.

Sunday morning and nothing to do.

Ennui creeps in via the French windows.

Flour in the air, settling slowly.

Even the weather feels like it's sleeping.

Sip the water that dinosaurs drank.

Cloying lavender lotion thick around your fingernails.

Grass grows even if he won't.

Ellipses, endless.

Your skin cells playing noughts and crosses.

Iambic heartbeats.

For years she didn't call, but neither did you.

The sorrow of eyelashes, blurred.

Words sprawl at the back of your tongue.

Every space between every atom.

Here we are. It's real.

~


End file.
